


In Which Steel Keeps His Promises

by ghostwriter00797



Category: Max Steel (TV 2013)
Genre: Berto is amused by all of this, Escape Attempts, Forge Being A Jerk, Gen, He has reasons for his actions but they're still not good ways to handle things, He suffers a bit in here, I hate Forge Ferrus, No one is in character I didn't even try, Running Away, Steel Leaves N-Tek AU, Telepathy of a sort, Ultralink Bond, Ultralink Bond Shenanigans, basically everything in season 2 happens, but with an added subplot of escape attempts and successes, sort of crack, there's some serious undertones but in general don't take it seriously, well he's trying to anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-18
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-06-12 09:06:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15336516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostwriter00797/pseuds/ghostwriter00797
Summary: Steel meant it when he said he was done being part of N-Tek, that he was leaving.Wherever Steel goes, Max follows.Wherever Max is, Forge Ferrus will find a way to bring him back, and by extension, Steel.Obviously, this isn't going to stop either of them from trying.





	In Which Steel Keeps His Promises

**Author's Note:**

> < Telepathy/Link Speak >  
>  **Steel's voice**  
>  I wrote this at around one in the morning after I woke up from a dream I had about this idea. It didn't turn out as serious as I thought it would. I am surprisingly okay with that.

Steel _meant_ it when he said he was leaving. Max knows it, feels the fury in his processor, in his head, in their heart. Commander Forge knows it too. He’s still weak, recovering from the loss of his arm, but that doesn’t mean he can’t assign a tail or six to keep an eye on them.

Max doesn’t even consider stopping his partner. Both of them have had enough betrayal in the short time they’ve been together, and the only constant is each other. Even if he didn’t need Steel to survive, Max would follow him to the edge of the universe and back. If Steel wants to leave, Max will go with him. They don’t _talk_ about it, per say, all too aware of how many eyes and ears are on them at all times, but there are other ways to plan together.

Max suddenly gains quite the interest in telepathy and psychic abilities. They’re pretty cool, and a teenage superhero has to have _some_ sort of hobby to keep himself sane. Coincidentally, Steel decides to learn how the human brain works, for purely scientific reasons. Obviously. He wouldn’t want to accidentally damage his host now, would he?

Driving Forge up the wall--which isn’t too hard considering his paranoid nature--is just the icing on the cake.

 

* * *

 

<Steel?>

< **Yes, Max?** >

<Jefferson’s gone.>

< **... Excellent**. >

 

* * *

 

Their first attempt is almost flawless. On Tuesday they only have one tail, Jefferson. Jefferson is prone to having one too many lunch breaks while on the job, probably because he doesn’t think that they’re really going to do anything. He’s very wrong about that.

Steel is gone in less than a minute, ducking under the semi that goes past Copper Canyon High at lunchtime everyday. All he has to do is hang on until it reaches the edge of Copper Canyon, hop off, and wait.

Jefferson returns with a sandwich, none the wiser, and simply assumes that Steel is linked into the Steel Suit as usual. Max finishes the school day in a ridiculously good mood. He heads home, careful not to lose his tail in traffic, and waits.

At three in the morning there’s a shift change. He’s got a five minute window to get out of the house, into the car, and going before anyone notices. Going out the window and down the balconies saves time, and he’s off. The engine is quiet, made for stealthy missions, and he takes his time. The border comes up, Steel flies in, they link up, and they’re gone.

 

* * *

 

“What do you mean they’re missing?”

“From what we can tell, Commander, they must have memorized the shift change and used that to their advantage-”

“How the _hell_ did they even know we were tailing them?”

“They’re not as oblivious as you think they are Chief.”

“Berto, just get to the lab and _find them!_ ”

“Fine, fine. No need to yell about it.”

 

* * *

 

<Steel! Steel, where are you?>

< **Don’t come near here Max, it’s a trap--** >

<Too late.>

< **Of course.** >

 

* * *

 

Two days later they’re back in Copper Canyon and under house arrest at the base.

 

* * *

 

<Are you ready?>

< **Of course I’m ready Max, I was** **_born_ ** **ready.** >

<Technically, you weren’t born at all.>

< **Oh, shut up you. Let me have my fun.** >

 

* * *

 

Their second attempt comes barely a week later. It’s rushed, but they’ve got a grudge to settle and a point to make.

“Do I even want to know how you got these sedatives? Actually, don’t answer that.”

It takes three days to find the mess hall in the N-Tek barracks, three hours to figure out the passcode, and thirty seconds to slip their payload into the food. Max has to resist the urge to rub his hands together while cackling evilly. Steel does enough cackling for the both of them.

After lunch that same day, the majority of N-Tek’s forces and the Commander himself are down for the count. They waltz right out of the base, take the TURBO cycle, and head as far in the opposite direction as they can.

 

* * *

 

“I have to say, I didn’t expect sedatives. That was pretty clever.”

“Berto, please stop complimenting their escape methods.”

“Well, we all expected them to go with brute force instead of subtlety--”

“ _Berto._ ”

 

* * *

 

< **Is he crazy? Threatening to keep you away from me for good? Wouldn’t that--** >

<\--Kill us? Yeah. I don’t think Uncle Ferrus is in his right mind at the moment.>

 

* * *

 

It takes two weeks for N-Tek to track them down to Utah. This time it’s Max that gets used as bait for his partner, and the lecture is nothing short of torture. Forge decides that they need more training to ‘keep their skills sharp’. Anyone with half a brain knows its to keep them too exhausted to run away again.

 

* * *

 

“Max, Steel, I’m only doing this because I’m concerned about you”

“ **Well you can take that concern and** **_shove it up your--_ ** ”

“ _Okay!_ We’re leaving now! _”_

 

* * *

 

The third attempt has to wait for a while. Between the TURBO Star, constant training, fending off Ultralink scouts, constant training, throwing Makino back through his wormhole, and _constant training_ , they don’t really have the time to hammer out the details. So, in the end, they don’t. Forge is still recovering from Ultralink possession, Molly is rebuilding THI, and the troops are spread thin to clean up the mess.

Nobody notices that they’re gone until two days later. As the old saying goes, third time's the charm.

 

* * *

 

< **So. We’ve got the complete TURBO Star.** >

<Yep.>

< **And now Dredd’s more homicidal than usual.** >

<Mm-hm.>

< **... You do realize we have to call Forge and tell him about the Doombringer, right Max?** >

< **_... Max?_ ** >

 

* * *

 

They do, in fact, call Forge. There is a lot of yelling, a lot of fighting, more yelling, and a lot of pain. To be fair, having a family member drop off the face of the Earth for six months is distressing, but the Commander’s reaction definitely qualifies as overkill.

“Uncle Ferrus, is the containment field really necessary?”

The look they get in place of a response would probably kill lesser men. Max blinks. Steel manages to get across the meaning of a rather vulgar hand gesture despite not having hands. Berto doubles over laughing in the background. Anyone not related to the chaotic duo can already tell that the time they’ve got until Makino invades is going to be _delightful_.

 

* * *

 

“Commander?”

“Yes, Jefferson?”

“Um. Are you aware that your hair is--”

“--Pink? Yes. Yes I am.”

 

* * *

 

< **How long do you think it will take before he realizes what I changed his computer’s background to?** >

<Considering the screaming I’ve been hearing for the past half hour? He already did.>

< **Good.** >

<Steel, you are a petty, petty Ultralink.>

< **Like you’re one to talk.** >

 

* * *

 

The final battle with Makino leaves them aching in places they didn’t know could be sore, gasping for air when they wake in the night, and wary for weeks afterward. Getting Jim McGrath back was the only good thing to come of it, and for once they’ve got an adult figure that’s just as locked out of the loop as they are. The overprotectiveness is a bit irritating, but it’s rational. The man has sixteen years of parenting to catch up on after all.

Their fourth and final attempt really isn’t an attempt, so much as it is a formal resignation. Steel gets the pleasure of smugly announcing the father-son-ultralink bonding roadtrip to Molly and Forge the hour before they go. The shade of purple Forge turns is both concerning and hilarious.

This time, no one dares to come after them.


End file.
